Long time no blahg

It's been awhile.. let's catch up!

Ethan and I went to Vegas. That was fun. We'd both never been before, so we spent most of trip being bewildered and walking around. And drinking. I had a lot of fun sleeping into the day and being up all night..and getting dressed up. I bought a bunch of Vegas clothes that I probably will never wear again. And shoes..ow. I feel silly wearing the shoes I did in a city where you walk everywhere. We went over two months ago, and I still have the blister scars on my feet.. yikes!

What else...oh! We also celebrated our one year anniversary on the 23rd of August. That made me really happy. We went and saw a free Gin Blossoms concert in Santa Cruz. I got Ethan a garlic holder. He got me roses, coffee and the Sunday paper in bed; I was a very happy girl that weekend.

Either shortly before or after I started classes, I'm in my fifth week now. Wow! I'm taking some interesting courses, though as they're still GEs, not as interesting as I'd like. Developmental Pysch, Human Sexuality, Art Composition and Writing. I would never admit to my dad or brother that I like writing a lot. I'm still very far from being any good at it...but something about it makes me really happy. So far classes are going well. I still don't know how much I liked this semester business, I feel like it's midterms time already but really I'm only about 1/4 in. I'm thinking about doing online sexuality (some part of) for my human sex presentation and paper...if anyone has good ideas of what my focus should be, let me know!

I had a couple strange things happen over the course of the last few months. Not related, but within myself.

First, I realized that the birth control pill I was taking caused me to become super depressed/anxious/moody. I had never, ever felt so bad in my life. I've suffered from different variations of depression before in my life, but this was a whole new beast. For about two months I was not myself. I was crying all the time, I couldn't tolerate people at all (which wasn't very good for my job or my relationship), and really hated myself. I was waking up at 3AM and crying for hours, and had these horrible thoughts running through my head. This was also around the time I'd quit smoking, so for the first few weeks I thought I was just withdrawing really bad. Long story short, I stopped taking it, and within a week I felt like myself again. I'm not really sure how people put up with me!

Secondly, everyone other day when I'd check facebook or myspace I'd see a girl around my age declaring her engagement/marriage/pregnancy/birth. This was blowing my mind. I spent a lot of time in the last couple months evaluating my thoughts toward marriage. My conclusion thus far is this: Marriage is something I don't understand. Not to say I think it's bad, or people shouldn't do it. It's just outside my grasp of comprehension. Especially for people my age (22ish). Here's my thought process...let's say I did understand marriage, and wanted to do it. Well, I'm 22. I'm going to change a LOT within the next 10 years. I've changed a lot in the last 9 months. Yes, it's easy to say and feel you love someone forever. However, you change, they change...what's important to you now may not be in 10 years. What you like about this person may not be attractive to you in 10 years. Whatever, you get my point. Again, my caveat is if you are 22 and married, engaged, I'm not knocking it...especially if you're happy. I'm just saying it's not for me. Okay, onto the point of "Why do people get married?". When I first thought I was falling in love I asked my friends and family what love meant to them. I like people's perspectives on things. So, I've asked the majority of my close friends and family what their thoughts on marriage are, and why they think it's something we do. To sum it up, I mostly got the answers, "It's what people expect you to do when you're in a committed relationship.", "Tax breaks, insurance, etc...", "If you want to have children, you should be married." Fair enough, though, I still don't understand the point. That being said, I don't understand the point of having babies...but I'm not one to say I will never be a mother. I've learned about the "maternal instinct", and I assume the "marriage instinct" might be there too. Just, right now, at this point in my life, I don't get it. To put this in context: I live with my boyfriend. We are incredibly committed to each other, perhaps to the point of co-dependence (not in the drug way...and I'm kidding anyway ;)). I love him very much, and he does me. We spend as much time together as possible. I know he'd do anything within his means for me, and I would for him. I don't feel any need to get married to him. I love him, our relationship works, and we trust each other explicitly. I don't see us breaking up anytime soon (or later). But, I don't want to marry him...I feel it would be unfair to at least him, where I'm still very young in terms of knowing what I want, and what I want to do forever. Okay...I could keep going on this, so I think I've made my point and I'll stop. :)

Let's see...tonight I'm going to see Counting Crows! I'm really excited that I get to see both of my  favorite 90's bands within a month of each other. Mr. Jones and meeeeeeeee!

I'll do better (promise!) at keeping this updated, hopefully with more pictures, less semi-nonsensical ramblings. byeee.

Shocking -- but not really.

I've always been curious and a little disturbed by the lack of resources and government spending for health care. Especially mental health care. I worked with mentally disabled adults for almost three years and saw the apathy and how things easily got swept under the rug for the mentally disabled who were unable to advocate for themselves. There are many wonderful people who work in the mental health field. It'd be unfair and wrong to say their aren't. However, it is a bit tragic the state of mental institutions in America, and the rest of the world, in my honest opinion.

Anyway, I'm sure many of you have seen this video already. But, wow.

woman dies on hospital floor

And on a happy note..

Today is my four week anniversary of not smoking. I feel fabuloooous!

Dysthymia..

I posted this on a blog I had about a year ago. I still feel like it's something I should share to whomever has stumbled across this blog. As you read this, remember that I'm honestly not a miserable person, I'm absolutely not looking for sympathy, and that in the past year I've grown a bit and am learning day by day how important it is to take good care of me and my mental health. I also feel I'm in a much better place in life than I was last year around this time. I will probably always feel this way, but I'm learning how to function and try to be as happy as I can with what I already have. I really just feel as this is one public forum I feel comfortable discussing such a thing in, I should take advantage and inform people of this thing I'd never heard of until a few years ago.

Ever since I can really remember, I've never been happy. Now now.. this isn't me writing to get sympathy or have anyone think "Aww, poor girl". Really. I just want to talk about it for a minute. There are many kinds of mental illnesses. We've all heard about depression, anxiety and probably bi-polar disease and schizophrenia. And I'm sure everyone at some point in their life has really been in the dumps and felt like they couldn't crawl out with all their might. Depression hits everyone. Life isn't perfect..etc etc.

I've seen a few counselors, psychiatrists and doctors concerning my unhappiness before. What would happen would be this. I would be really sad, would make an appointment.. go for a few appointments, get prescribed some pills and after a month or so I would feel better and wonder why I even bothered. I know other people who have done this too. I would assume you know at least one person who has been on anti-depressants before. I've been diagnosed with depression all those times. One day, a doctor told me a new word that kind of meant the same thing. Dysthymia? He explained to me what it was, and I said.. "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh......". It made sense for the first time ever. It reminded me of when I found out I needed glasses and thought that everyone had to squint at the board to read it. It also made me feel a little less crazy.

I had never heard of something like this before. Dysthymia. Here's a definition i scrounged up.

Is chronic mild to moderate chronic depression, as opposed to major depression. The DSM-IV mandates the same symptoms as for major depression, except for suicidality, but requires only three symptoms in all, so long as they have persisted over two years. Mild to moderate is a misnomer, as dysthymia can make a person’s life as miserable as major depression.

The way the doctor described it to me was basically like, there is a line, that's "normal", happy, content, whatever. People with dysthymia stay below the line all the time. So relatively speaking that is normal. However, normal sucks. I found that yeah, I feel like shit all the time. I'm generally most happy when I'm lying in bed.. and doing things (making my bed, taking a shower, cooking meals, paying bills) aren't as easy as I feel they should be. I struggle for confidence, worth and self-esteem. I like this description:

Still, we are able to function, a sort of death-in-life existence that gets us out into the world and to work and the duties of staying alive then back to our homes and the blessed relief of flopping into our unmade beds.

All too often, we are told to snap out of it. That the invisible water torture we carry in our heads is our own fault. And shamed into thinking something is wrong with our attitudes, we fail to seek help. Or, if we do, it's our family physician who confuses a very real chemical imbalance in the brain with some imaginary defect in our personality. And so we are sent away with a stupid happy pill such as a tranquilizer (whose depressive effect only adds to our quiet misery).

Some of us turn to the bottle or illegal drugs. Others seek a more permanent solution. Yes, even milder forms of depression can be lethal (experts estimate anywhere from 3 to 12 percent of people with dysthymia cure themselves by suicide).

stolen from here

Most people can articulate better than me. Which is why I have a blog.. to steal other people's good ideas and share them with you!

So I have this..thing. Good, I know what it is and that I'm not necessarily crazy. I know I'll probably have it forever and that basically I need to do whatever I can to make it better. The bad news is I am bad with taking pills. I will get them, take them, then stop because I feel better. Self-destructive? No. Just irresponsible. And cheap. And I am never quite sure if they are working, or if my brain is into the placebo effect. But I can get out of bed, take a shower and try and eat right and exercise. Most of the time this works. By most of the time.. I would say.. 75%.

Then...... it hits. Like a depression on top of a depression. I shut down. Collapse. Contemplate suicide on the rare occasion. Feel hopeless, worthless, incapable of receiving love (from myself or anyone else). I do things that are bad. Not *bad* bad. Just, not good. I don't answer phone calls, I sleep for 16+ hours. I call-in to work or skip school. I don't eat. I smoke. I cry. Etc, you get the point. I do this until I don't. It's fucked up, and I hate it. I hope some day (soon!) I will have developed the skills to stop this before it starts and not let myself get away with it. Luckily, it's been awhile since I've been that miserable.

Every once in a blue moon.. I am happy. Content. I love life and everything about it. Then it goes away.. but for those moments I embrace it..

Most days I fake it (fake it until you make it?). And that's okay for now. I would love to be content on a daily basis. But honestly, to me, that doesn't seem real. Is it real? Or is everyone else faking it too? I hope, pray all the time that there is more to life than this, but until then....

I don't hide behind this, or make it "who I am". It's a part of me.

for anyone who cares to read more

Thanks

Hikin'

I went on a hike this Tuesday. It was sort of an accident.. I really just wanted to get out of the house and be outside. Go to the park? A bike ride? Finally I decided I just wanted to go find some wildflowers and take pictures of them. I thought Pulgas Ridge would be a nice place to go for such a thing, though, I saw few flowers, but went on a four mile hike which turned out to be pretty, right around sundown.

Preview

Fun, pretty times. I liked hiking by myself quite a bit. Me+a camera.. extremely cathartic. Seeing a deer was pretty freakin' awesome, too.

I have an awesome boyfriend..

..whom I love very much. I'm so very lucky.

Ethan and I at the Golden Gate Bridge, SF, CA. 2007

I wanted to share a picture, and I thought it deserved a nice little introduction. :)

Pretty frequently I step back and realize how lucky I am to have Ethan in my life, and am constantly amazed at how easy our relationship has been, as well as daily realizing how much I adore him.

Okay, enough of that for now. Carry on.

my quit smoking blog

i quit!